Week Ahead: Committee likely to vote on nominee for FDA commissioner

Dec. 1-7: As we move closer to winter, fewer people get a flu shot. But as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention points out, it’s not too late. National Influenza Vaccination Week, an awareness campaign the CDC has been running since 2005, was designed in part to get stragglers (like the Week Ahead author) motivated. Vaccinations prevented an estimated 5.3 million cases of the flu, 2.6 million influenza-associated medical visits, and 85,000 influenza-associated hospitalizations during the 2016-17 season, according to the CDC. Nonetheless, vaccination rates have been relatively flat over the past decade, which is troubling to public health officials.

Dec. 3: Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) is hoping to hold a vote on Dr. Stephen Hahn’s nomination to lead the Food and Drug Administration. During his confirmation hearing late last month, Hahn pledged to work with Congress on a number of hot-button topics, including drug pricing and shortages. Hahn, who serves as chief medical executive at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, did take some heat from both sides of the aisle over the Trump administration backing off of plans to ban flavored e-cigarettes. While saying he was “alarmed” by the data showing spikes in vaping-related illnesses and deaths, he stopped short of criticizing the administration’s decision, saying, “I don’t have all the facts.”

Dec. 5-6: The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission holds its monthly meeting. An agenda was not available at deadline, but Modern Healthcare rules and regulations reporter Michael Brady, will be on hand to break down key policy issues discussed by the panel.